The New War CandidateMajor Paul Hackett for Congressby Jack Random
www.dissidentvoice.org
August 3, 2005

There
is something obscene about the media enchantment with the congressional
candidacy of Marine Major Paul Hackett of Ohio, a man who opposed the war
yet volunteered to serve in it. That the Democrats seem infatuated with
such a candidate is a spectacle that taxes the equilibrium of all
reasonable observers. Clearly, the minority party has learned nothing from
the failed candidacies of Albert Gore and John Kerry.

Only Bill Clinton, a man of extraordinary
charm and the mind of a mainstream data base, could pull off such a
delicate balance: Steering the ship of state hard right while managing to
appease his liberal loyalists with the admonition that it could be worse.

The legacy of Bill Clinton will always be a
mixed metaphor. The policies of Clinton --deregulation of industries,
privatization of social services, expansion of global exploitation under
the guise of free trade, and the militarization of global economics --
blended painlessly with the policies of the younger Bush administration,
leaving the party of Roosevelt in a perpetual spiral of self-destruction,
forever seeking the next great compromise, oblivious that a compromise at
the core is certain demise.

What a strange and tortured legacy: To have
a party actively seeking those who fought in the war while opposing it.
Should we also oppose crime by being criminals? Can we oppose terrorism by
being terrorists?

Shall we find the truth by practicing
deception? Then neither can we oppose a war by volunteering to fight it.

There are far too many insoluble equations
in the natural world without bothering to deconstruct political
conundrums. Sometimes a contradiction is a contradiction. It belies an
underlying absence of core conviction. We have too many politicians who
decry corporate abuse yet sanction every new round of deregulation. We
have too many politicians who claim to embrace a living wage and basic
standards of labor yet vote for NAFTA, CAFTA and the policies of
globalization. We have too many politicians who are champions of civil
liberties but find the suspension of habeas corpus a mildly upsetting
necessity. We have too many politicians who find it comfortable to oppose
the war in hindsight but support the occupation in virtual perpetuity. We
have too many politicians who want to make it comfortable for the majority
of Americans to have been dead wrong on the war and for that catastrophic
error in judgment to have cost so many lives.

To have been wrong in initiating a war of
naked aggression is not like losing a football game. The cost in life,
limb and treasure is extraordinary. Just as it is in Baghdad, Fallujah,
Ramadi and in the far reaches of the Anbar province, the occupation should
be a part of our conscious lives each and every day. We, as a people, were
given every opportunity to learn the truth before this war began. A
million voices literally rose up at once to tell us we were wrong. Honest
members of the administration, the intelligence community, and officials
of foreign governments informed us repeatedly that this was an unnecessary
war and a colossal mistake.

We cannot now pretend it was solely our
government’s doing. It could not have been done without our complicity
and support. We cannot pretend that what began as one of the two most
egregious crimes a nation can commit (aggressive war and genocide) has
suddenly become virtuous because America is a virtuous nation with a
peace-loving people.

We had a part in the commission of this
crime and we have a part in its continuing execution. We cannot escape
accountability for what we have done in concert with our government any
more than we can avoid responsibility for bringing it to an end.

If you are the perpetrator of a crime and
the creator of a monumental disaster, you simply cannot be trusted as the
master administrator of the solution. We are no fools. Whether our real
reasons for going to war were economic or strategic or both, we know they
are still in place. The oil pipelines are still priority and our massive
military bases do not have the appearance of temporary structures. Given
these fundamental realities, our soldiers are the last on earth to create
a stable and relatively equitable society in Iraq. Our allies in this
disaster are similarly unsuitable.

The only responsibility we can and must
assume is economic aid commensurate with the destruction we have wrought.
The Iraqis, themselves, in cooperation and partnership with a community of
nations not engaged in the war, must secure the peace, rebuild the nation,
and create a government that optimally fulfills their needs.

America can have no part in this.

If we begin with an understanding of the
great wrong we have done, it will lead directly to the only possible
resolution. When we acknowledge that the occupation is what it undeniably
is -- neither a liberation nor an exercise in international charity but an
ongoing seizure of strategic geography and vital resources, then we will
bring it to an end.

That is our solemn responsibility.

Do not give us candidates that will fight in
a war they do not believe in. Give us candidates that will accept our
responsibility and fulfill it.

Jack Random
is the author of Ghost Dance Insurrection (Dry Bones Press) the
Jazzman Chronicles, Volumes I and II (City
Lights Books). The Chronicles have been published by CounterPunch,
the Albion Monitor, Buzzle, Dissident Voice and
others. Visit his website:
www.jackrandom.com.